from their
own lips."

"I know--I know," he replied. "Rufus would give me a home. Rufus
would give me money--all I need a hundred times over. But is that what
I really need? I want to do something myself, David--to be somebody
myself. I have it in me. All I ask is an opportunity." He brought
his fist down on his knee. "And by heaven, I will find it! I will
show them I'm not the worthless fellow I seem."

"But they don't think you worthless, Professor," said I, addressing him
as I might have, had we been in the cabin again. "They have been
searching for you everywhere----"

"But never expecting to find me as I am now," he interrupted, spreading
wide his arms and inviting me to behold him as he was, a shabby waiter.
"Rufus, who has made what the world calls a success, would be proud of
me; and Penelope, who has learned to think with the rest of the world,
would be proud of me--proud to present me to her friends--to splendid
fellows like Talcott and his muddle-headed companion." He leaned
forward and tapped me on the knee with his long forefinger, and his
face broke into a bitter smile as he spoke more quietly. "David, I
have seen Penelope. I came to New York just to be near her, and many a
night I have stood for hours across the street from her house only to
get a glimpse of her. And sometimes as I see her stepping in or out of
her carriage I say to myself that she cannot be my daughter; and if I
spoke to her how high she would toss her head! Why, she would lose
less caste by walking with Talcott drunk than with me as I am now."

"But she need not see you as you are now," I protested, half smiling at
the incongruous picture which he had drawn of Penelope walking down the
avenue by the side of this shabby waiter. "They need not even know----"

I paused to grasp at some inoffensive phrase in which to describe his
forlorn condition.

"That I have fallen so low," he exclaimed. He had been quick to see my
predicament, and laughed. "I know what you are thinking of, David.
You saw me an obsequious, tip-grasping fellow, with a spirit as heavy
as his feet. You think me broken and down and out." The hands spread
wide again. "I--down and out? Why, Davy, I've been like this a score
of times, and I am still game. You must not think that because of a
little temporary embarrassment I am in prime condition to go crawling
to Rufus and tell him that I have failed and need his help. I told
Rufus that I would c